cuts are holding onto the money that they're collecting from the tax cuts and no jobs are trickling down. >> in a news conference thursday, president obama empathized with the demonstrators. >> i think people are frustrated, and the protestors are giving voice to a more broad-based frustration about how our financial system works. >> here the president wants to say, look, i'm on the side of the mid e8 class here. i want more fairness in our country. the republicans want to take you backward. >> joining me now to talk about how the jobs report is playing out in washington, nbc's kristen walker at the white house this afternoon. kristen, positive spin for the report seems to be it could have been worse. how's the white house playing this one? >> reporter: that's absolutely right, craig. hi there. the white house never makes too much of any of these jobs reports. essentially today they're coming out and saying, look, this is a step in the right direction

although clearly a lot more needs to be done. this is not enough growth. but there are according to economists some positive things in this report. 103,000 jobs added. but that stubborn unemployment rate still stuck at 9.1%. but we saw growth in the healthcare sector, the construction sector, although manufacturing did dip which is disconcerting to some economists. so white house officials not making too much of this report, but they say look, at least it wasn't stagnant as we initially saw last month. of course, that report from last month was revised in this month's report. craig? >> let's take a listen to speaker john boehner's reaction to the report. take a listen. >> there's a different report that's out this morning. a report from the department of labor. and i'm sorry to say the news isn't good. after three years of false hopes and broken promises, americans continue to be left asking the question, where are the jobs?

it's high time we trust the american people to liberate our economy from the shackles of this government. >> kristen, how's the report going to play into the politics of passing the president's jobs bill? >> well, the republicans are going to use it as you just heard speaker boehner and point to that 9.1% figure. they're going to say, look, this is an indication that president's policies have failed, that this jobs bill is just another stimulus plan which of course that stimulus plan didn't add the amount of jobs that it initially intended to. and then you're going to hear the president make the case, look, this is an indication that urgent action needs to be taken. we saw him point to that yesterday during a news conference when he said that if the jobs bill isn't passed we run the risk of potentially slipping into another recession. so both sides are going to see what they want in these numbers, craig. >> nbc's kristen welker from the white house on this friday afternoon.

let's take a closer look at what's inside the jobs report now. helping us do that, an economics professor from the university of maryland, also the former chief economist at the u.s. international trade commission. good afternoon, sir. >> good afternoon. >> let's start with the numbers here. first of all, for folks who don't follow these things as closely as we all do, how many jobs does it take every month to keep up with population growth? and how many jobs would need to be created to actually reduce that 9.1% figure? >> well, just to stay even you need about 130,000 jobs a month. and say to get down to 6% unemployment in three years you need 400,000 jobs per month. that would be over 13 million jobs. >> and when was the last time we were able to create about 400,000 jobs per month on average? >> well, early in the last decade when we were booming along and we had the new economy and all that, we were creating a lot of jobs. we did so during the clinton years and in the first bush years. i mean, the economy's well capable of doing this.

but it's just growing too slowly because demand is too weak. and that goes back to things the president talked about yesterday. he lamb pasted china yesterday for its trade policies and issues of energy development and the mortgage crisis and so forth a lot of pieces have to be put together to fix this thing. >> i want to come back to that in a moment. we just this 9.1% figure to describe unemployment. but you contend and lots of other folks contend as well that the number is much higher. how high do we think unemployment really is in this country? >> well, if we count in those people that have stopped looking for work butter genuineje but a generally interested, and people who say i'd like a full time job but can't get one we're at 16.5%. throw in the recent college graduates, last two, three, four years that are working at starbucks and barnes & noble and things like that and not using their degrees, you're up around 20%. that's why we have so many kids living with their parents.

>> and the president has been pushing his jobs bill, of course, as a short term solution to a certain extent. and there have been a number of economists who have said that yes, in the short term this could create some jobs in this country. what's your take on the president's jobs bill and its ability to sort of act as a shot in the arm? >> well, it's a mixed bag. i feel that it could create maybe 350,000 jobs for two years, not the 2 million that he's talking about. because a lot of it is just repeating what's already in place. keeping that tax break on the payroll tax. continuing to finance school teachers and state and local level. also he has to pay for that by taking money from other places. the infrastructure bank's a good thing. that would have long-term benefits. basically it doesn't fix those structural problems that need being fixed. and he's not talking about that. and that is disturbing. i have to say, republicans generally aren't talking about it. so i'm even more disturbed. >> peter morici, university of

maryland. always a pleasure. thank you for your time. >> take care. folks, we have some breaking news that we are following here at msnbc. potential road block to alabama's new and controversy immigration law which is considered by many to be the toughest in the country. we have just learned that the department of justice,doj, now asking a federal appeals court to block enforcement of the law. that law again allows authorities in alabama to question people being suspected of being in this country illegally. it also allows them to hold those folks without bond and allows officials to check the immigration status of students in public schools. for the past few days there have been a number stories of hundreds if not thousands of students who are not going to school in alabama as a result. the federal government says that law could cause problems for many people, including children who are in the state illegally there in alabama. stunning twist now in the case of a missing baby in missouri. debra bradley and jeremy erwin say that someone snatched their

10-month-old daughter lisa from her crib monday night. her parents tearfully appealed for her return. but late yesterday kansas city police said the parents had stopped cooperating with detectives. >> like i said before, they've been cooperating. it's been very helpful. tonight they decided to stop talking to detectives. and i don't have to illustrate how that affects the investigation. it speaks for itself. >> now, the parents responded this morning on "the today show". >> we were at the station yesterday being interviewed again. and i just had reached my -- i just had reached my boiling point. and i asked them, i said, "guys, i can't do this any more today. i need a break". >> we don't care what anybody says or thinks or we don't care what they think. i mean, our concern is to find lisa. we just ask that everybody please continue to look for her

and pray for her safe return. >> joining me now on the phone is kansas city police captain steve young. captain young, let's start with the obvious question here. are the parents of baby lisa erwin, are they cooperating with detectives or not? >> well, i'll tell you. you played the statement that i gave last night and you played what they said this morning. and in response to what they said this morning, my reply to that is great. our door is open. our one and only goal right now is to find this missing child. and the parents' involvement in the investigation can't be overstated. they're a key piece to putting this together. and our door is open. >> has their involvement changed from the beginning of the investigation until now? >> well, just in regard to what i said last night and what i said now, they say that they want to talk to us and that's great. our door is open. but since i made that statement last night, up until just a few

moments ago i just checked we still haven't spoke within them. >> you still haven't spoken to them. >> that's right. >> and you know, for folks who are watching this play out, folks who are listening to it, when you hear that parents are not cooperating in the search for their missing baby, you know how that sounds. >> well, i'm not going to try to put thoughts in people's minds. i can only report what the investigation is leading. and like i said, our one and only goal is to find this girl. and them being a part of the investigation is critical. >> debra bradley says she was given a lie detector test and she admitted that she failed. can you comment on that at all? >> you know, i can't comment on details of the investigation. she's free to say whatever she would like. >> why hasn't the husband been asked to take a lie detector test? >> i beg your pardon? >> why hasn't the husband been asked to take a lie detector test, or has he? >> you know, again, for me

myself, i don't know the answer to that question. if i did i probably wouldn't be able to talk about it. it's a detail of the investigation. >> i understand the department has shut down the command post that had been set up near the erwin home. >> yes. >> is that true? and if so why? >> that is true. but it is completely unrelated to what we've been talking about. from the very beginning we set the command post up where it was because of the geography. and we knew we would have to do door-to-door, we would have to search woods. last night they reached the conclusion that we had completely saturated this area from a geography standpoint and it no longer made sense to maintain a command post away from a police facility. >> all right. kansas city police captain steve young. captain, thank you so much for your time. and please update us should there be a major development in this case here in the next hour. >> we will. we appreciate your help on the story, thank you. >> we want to let our folks who are watching know that we're going to talk to a former fbi profiler in the next half hour about this case and some of the oddities that have been revealed over the past 12, 24-hours.

it has been 10 years since the beginning of the war in afghanistan. we're going to look at the strategy, the cost in dollars, and in lives, and we'll also look the a the politics of the war as well. plus why an entire town was forced to evacuate after this train derailed. first though a quick look at what's happening on wall street right now on the heels of those jobs numbers that were released about 3 1/2 hours ago, dow up slightly, s & p, nasdaq both down. at bayer, we're re-inventing aspirin for pain relief.

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>> good afternoon. on my orders the united states military has begun strikes against al qaeda terrorist training camps and military installations of the taliban

regime in afghanistan. and with that, operation enduring freedom began ten years ago today. the decade has been a costly one. war-related expenses to date in afghanistan nearly $340 billion. that's almost 8 billion every month. 98,000 troops remain on the frontlines there. nearly 1800 have laid down their lives. more than 14,000 have been wounded, 532 are amputees. nbc's reporter is in afghanistan. a congressional candidate for illinois, colonel jack jacobs is an msnbc military analyst, and a communications director for the dnc. thank all of you for being with us this afternoon. tia i want to start with you on the ground there in kabul. what's happening? any major developments in that country? >> well, craig, what i can tell you is today soldiers in southern afghanistan did wake up

to rocket fire, just proof that war is still going on in afghanistan. there are still areas where the battle rages. there's a large fight ensuing in the country, but there have been gains that have been made as well. we have to remember that. and although it has been afghanistan's longest war, we also have to remember it has also been afghanistan's most neglected war for several years it was known as the forgotten war. many people will tell you that war didn't really restart until 2009. >> you mentioned gains. what are some of the gains that have been made there in that country? >> well, even here just in the capital of kabul, when you drive around compared to what it looked like under the taliban regime you're seeing business is building up. you're seeing a private industry. yes, you're still seeing people begging on the street, but at the same time you're seeing those beggers holding cell phones. there's a private airline. there's television stations. but we have to remember that this is the capital of kabul.

the majority of the country is a rural country. the districts and villages. those people, they're still waiting to go seat infrastructure, they're still waiting to seat help come. they're the ones that are facing the day-to-day battle alongside these nato coalition force. >> major dufner, you were wounded in iraq, received the purple heart for your service. you wrote an op ed this morning patting the president on the back for his work in afghanistan. there's a recent pew poll that shows about 50% of post 9/11 veterans think that war in afghanistan is worth it. 41% of the general public thinks that. what do you make of numbers like those? >> you know, i think that ten years in most of us would not have believed we would still be in afghanistan. but i do think that we are far better off now than we were just three years ago. we have really decimated the al qaeda leadership. we've rolled back many of the taliban's gains. and our troops have done a tremendous job in training up the afghan national forces.

i think we've made gains. we still have a long road to go. but i think the president, i applaud him for listening to the commanders on the ground. >> i want to bring you in here, colonel. let's talk about what we haven't gotten right in that country. my college roommate, he's a c 130 pilot. he spent some time there. he says one of the things is the train. we grossly underestimated the terrain in that country. general mcchrystal yesterday speaking said one of the things is language. a lot of our soldiers, men on the ground there, we didn't bother, we were unwilling or unable to learn the die lengths and the variety of dialects in that country. what else did we get wrong? >> the entire strategy. don't forget that when the taliban was routed at the very beginning it was done with a very few number of american soldiers. and a large number of afghans. northern alliance people who did the outside work and heavy lifting. then we ignored the place completely while we went to iraq. and of course the taliban came back. trying to route them again, we thought it was going to be a

conventional war. poured lots of conventional troops in there and we'll be able to kill all the bad guys and the good guys will come out of the woodwork. >> how did we not know that before we went in? >> that's the essential question. we knew that but just didn't do it. we knew that in vietnam. the situation was pretty much the same. we had to convince the local people to support the regime. we couldn't do it then and we couldn't do it now because we were not willing to stay there. the decades general mcchrystal said it would take. >> major duckworth, there are those who have said that if the goal in iraq was as it was stated, if the goal was to get osama bin laden which we have and to prevent that country from being a safe haven for al qaeda, which we have done by a lot of measures, now the argument could be made they've moved into pakistan and somalia and other places, but if the goal has been achieved there, why do we stay? >> you know, in this case i agree with jeff. we need to turn over much of the security to the afghan national

forces. our troops have done a great job of training them up. i think we should start drawing down. but i want us to leave in such a way that we don't have to go back. >> karen, let's talk about the political ramifications here. mitt romney just gave his speech on foreign policy. here's what he said about afghanistan. take a listen. let's talk about the on the other side. >> the force level necessary to secure our gains and complete our mission successfully is a decision i will make free from politics. this is very simple. if you do not want america to be the strongest nation on earth, i'm not your president. you have that president today. >> does mr. romney come off sounding presidential there? >> well, he was certainly trying to sound presidential there, although i think if you get a closer look at sort of what he said and his experience which is zero and what the president has done, i think an honest assessment would say that foreign policy is actually an

area where president obama is on very solid ground. he made the point of going after osama bin laden. it was a promise made and a promise kept. tammy duckworth talked about some of the other accomplishments. but i'll tell you what i think is important just from a political perspective here. ten years into the war in afghanistan. really we have not seen or heard much from the republican field just yet about their vision for foreign policy and the wars in iraq and afghanistan. and not in a way that lays out the interconnectedness of our global economy, our energy security, our economic security. we went through a whole election in 2010 where essentially almost none of the members of congress who were elected were ever asked these questions. and yet now they're making very critical decisions. so i think while this hasn't been front and center in this presidential contest, i think it's incredible important that we take a close look at what these guys are willing to say and do and really press them on what their vision would be. >> last question yes or no to each of you really quickly here.

when we leave afghanistan, will that country be politically stable and secure enough to stand on its own? karen i'll start with you. yes or no. >> i hope so. >> karen, yes or no? >> not if more is done. and i think they need a little more time. >> major duckworth? >> yeah, i think that they will be but we have to help them get there. >> colonel, we'll end with you. >> short answer is no. never been a country. it's been centrally governed from kabul and probably never will be. >> and you made an interesting note there that sort of karen alluded to, the president when it comes to foreign policy he has a leg to stand on. >> well, he's killed more bad guys surely than did the previous president relying on predator strikes, lots of intelligence, good intelligence from pakistan and special operations. >> thanks to all of you. appreciate your time this afternoon. >> thanks. holiday sales are expected to rise this winter, expected

being the operative word there. we're going to take a look at the outlook for holiday hiring. also, say cheese. police are looking for this guy after his picture was posted on facebook. ♪ ♪ ♪ when your chain of supply ♪ goes from here to shanghai, that's logistics. ♪ ♪ chips from here, boards from there ♪ ♪ track it all through the air, that's logistics. ♪ ♪ clearing customs like that ♪ hurry up no time flat that's logistics. ♪ ♪ all new technology ups brings to me, ♪ ♪ that's logistics. ♪

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a small town in illinois has been forced to evacuate after a freight train derailed and exploded this morning. it was carrying ethanol and possibly other chemicals as well when it went off the tracks 100 miles southwest of chicago. about 25 cars overturned before several tanker cars exploded. they took five hours to get the fire under control. no injuries have been reported. a florida man was seriously hurt after leading police on a high-speed chase and then crashing. police were investigating a hit-and-run when the suspect shifted into reverse, hit a

patrol car, then took off with the cops following closely behind. eventually the truck clipped one of the patrol cars and flipped onto its hood. one officer was hurt. a suspect, 42-year-old kenneth monte, faces several charges including aggravated battery and driving under the influence. and georgia police are asking the public to help track down this guy. officials say he's a suspect in a car break in and purse theft. apparently the victim had her cell phone set to automatically upload to facebook any photos taken with the phone. well, the victim checked the facebook page after she was robbed and a picture of this man was posted. now, authorities want to ask the guy how the picture ended up on the victim's facebook page. search for baby lisa, police say they have no silent leads so far. they also say that parents are not cooperating anymore. the parents are disputing that. where the investigation goes next. also the battle between senator scott brown and his

democratic opponent, elizabeth warren. but not about jobs or the economy, it's about clothes. actually it's about no clothes. we'll explain. [ male announcer ] if you're only brushing,

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and kill bad breath germs for a whole mouth clean. so go beyond the brush with listerine® total care, the most complete mouthwash. now get all the benefits... without the alcohol. new listerine® total care zero. potential road block to alabama's new controversial immigration law widely considered to be the toughest in the country. let's go to washington's justice correspondent pete williams to break it down for us. >> reporter: the government would like to have a road block here. they've asked a federal court to block some provisions of alabama's tough new immigration law that's gone into effect. the government says what's wrong with this law is states can't device their own schemes to basically drive all illegal immigrants or as they call in the law aliens out of the state. they call the alabama law a blunt instrument that would impede the federal enforcement of the law.

an interesting argument, craig, the government says the alabama law will create new concerns for surrounding states to which aliens in using the term of this motion deport themselves. they cite news accounts that say that many illegal immigrants are leaving alabama, and that individual parents are deciding not to send their children to school. now, the government is challenging a couple of provisions of this law. a federal judge in alabama stopped some provisions but allowed most of the law to go into effect. and it's those provisions in effect that government wants to stop. makes it a crime to fail to carry immigration papers, requires the police to detain anybody that they think might be here illegally if they stop them for traffic stops, and also requires schools to track the immigration status of students. >> pete williams from d.c. for us on this friday afternoon. let's take a look at some of the other top stories. three women have the honor of sharing the nobel peace prize

today. they were all selected for their work campaigning for women's rights. and official steve jobs biography will be released october 24th. jobs says he authorized the book so his kids could get to know him better. also sales of that same turtleneck that he often wore? sales have doubled since wednesday a government panel says the blood tests that check for prostate cancer do more harm than good and that healthy men should no longer get those tests. and according to chiropractors, therea new medical condition called text neck on the rise because of all those folks spent hunched over their cell phones and tablet screens. been a big week of not especially happy economic reports. unemployment has unchanged still at 9.1%. home sales still in a slump. the holiday shopping season that's just around the corner apparently is not expected to be a whole lot better than last year's. we have some economic team coverage for you this friday. cnbc's mandy drury will bring us

news on the housing and banking front. first though courtney wiggan to talk about the holidays. i understand new numbers are out about what people are planning to spend. and this also not really that good. >> reporter: yeah exactly. so it looks at least as if right now consumers plan to spend about the same that she spent last year. majority of consumers, i believe about 64%, which kind of goes hand in hand with what retailers are planning to do as far as hiring. overall sales are expected to increase about 3%. and that's above and beyond that 5% increase we saw last year. so a tough comparison really to be able to get over. so retailers by and large are hiring about the same amount of seasonal, that temporary help, as they did last year. about a half million or so expected, some more, some less, the majority about the same. >> can we expect retailers to have some major sales, or can we expect retailers with their

special offerings to also be sort of along the same lines as last year? >> reporter: probably a lot about what we saw last year. you have to run some kind of sales, some kind of promotions to get the folks in the stores. a lot of data is showing from shopper track about 50% of all transactions that happened in the store have been researched online ahead of time. so consumers know what the prices that they're looking for. retailers are going to have to deliver on those numbers. >> courtney, where are you, by was sunny. >> reporter: i'm at the toys r us in times square. >> appreciate that. courtney reagan. let's turn to mandy drury. home ownership in this country has fallen to 65%. it has seen the biggest drop since the great depression. the american dream not a reality for more than a third of the country right now. >> reporter: yeah. >> this is despite 30-year fixed rate, 15-year fixed rate mortgages at an all-time low. why can't we get more people into homes right now in america?

>> reporter: that is such an excellent question. obviously the housing slump really can't seem to get off its knees. it's really taking its toll. to your point about record low interest rates. there are a lot of people out there who do want to refinance or buy a home to take advantage of these record low interest rates. the problem is that credit standards have tightnd. and maybe you could argue that is a good thing. but nonetheless it means you might want to refinance but you just don't have the credit score. so also the other problem is that the economy is also bumping along the bottom here. if you feel that maybe things are going to get worse and maybe you can get a price that is even cheaper in three months' time, maybe you'd say well why would i want it buy now. but to your point about the american dream being slammed, americans who own their homes have seen the biggest decline since the great depression as you mentioned. in fact the rate of home ownership is now even lower than it was back in 2000. so we're kind of like worse than we were a decade ago. >> really quickly here, bank fees, a lot of folks very angry about these things. bank of america of course

announcing that $5 fee for purchasing with a debit card. citi bank charging fees for checking accounts unless you maintain a minimum balance now. what's happening here? are we going to start seeing every major bank follow suit? >> reporter: it wouldn't surprise me. it does seem to be following an industry trend here, craig. as you mentioned, citibank is going to be slapping customers with rate hikes on checking accounts. this comes after bank of america increased fees for debit card purchases. the banks are saying, craig, look, we need to be able to use these fees to recover the money that we lost when the government kept what banks could charge retailers for customers who use debit cards. so they're pointing the finger at the government. >> yesterday president obama said that was hogwash. so mandy drury, cnbc. appreciate it. have a great weekend. >> you too. update now in the case of the missing 10-month-old baby girl in missouri. just this hour the captain of the kansas city police said cops have not spoken today with the barnts of baby lee so erwin who

vanished from her bedroom crib earlier this week. police said last night that parents had stopped cooperating with investigators. parents denying that, though, telling "the today show" that they are working with police. they just want to find baby lisa, joining us nsnbc analyst, fbi profiler cliff van zant. what do you make of this back and forth between the police and the parents? >> in every one of these cases, craig, we know the parents are always the one last with their child. in this case the mother. so you always have to eliminate that person while you're moving out into the community trying to find who else may have been responsible. in this case, the mother herself said she took a polygraph. she said the police told her she failed it. well, when you take a polygraph you're either truthful, you're inconclusive or you're deceptive. so she fell somewhere in there. but again, a polygraph isn't an end all do all, especially when you're under the stress that a parent would be. >> hey, clint, why would they

ask the mom to take a polygraph test? and to our knowledge at this point the dad was not asked to take one. what does that mean? or are we reading too much into it? >> well, the police seem to be comfortable with the father was out of the picture at the time the child disappeared. the mother said i put the baby down at 8:30. the father comes in at 4:00 a.m. but this path that kidnapper would have to take, craig, this es -- somebody's got to climb through a window. not the baby's window but a window that's used for a computer room. got to climb through that window. you've got to walk as you show here you've got to climb through this window, you've got to walk through the house, find the baby, get the baby out of the bed, pick the baby up, turn around, go out that front door. police are saying unless somebody really knows this house very, very well and exactly where that baby's room is, we're not necessarily buying the story. so do they disbelieve the mother? no. but they're trying to rule the

mother out by investigation to include polygraph. but right now they don't have any other suspects. and they're still not 100% convinced, i think, they're getting all the information they need from inside the house and maybe from the parents. >> yes or no here, clint, really quickly here. if the parents, one of them or both of them, if they were suspects, would the police even admit that to us? >> no. >> okay. >> the investigation would continue. the last thing you want to do is assume somebody who's lost their child until you really know you've got the facts. >> have a great weekend, clint. thank you for the insight. >> thanks for having me. coming up what dr. conrad murray told police about michael jackson's death in his own words for the first time. and first there were soccer moms. now there are walmart moms. who are they and what are they thinking and saying about next year's presidential election? gn with a lavender scent. amazing microcapsules absorb and neutralize odor releasing scent anytime you need it. all day long.

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while the number of people who smoke continues to go down in the u.s., overall experts say certain professions have higher smoking rates than others. a new report from the cdc reveals people who work in the mining and foodservice industries are the most likely to smoke along with construction workers, while educators are the least likely. well, one of the key demographics in any presidential election year, working moms, sometimes known as walmart moms. they can turn a candidate obama into a president obama or democratic majority into a republican majority in the house. the question is, who will win their support in 2012? joining me to talk about it, two pollsters who recently spent some time with these walmart moms.

thank you both so much for joining me this afternoon. margie, i'm going to start with you. walmart mom, what is a walmart mom? how do we define this? >> walmart moms are with children under 18 living at home who have shopped in a walmart in the last month. they're about 14 to 17% of the population. and my firm along with neil newhouse's firm have been tracking these moms since last year. they're very much swing. they started off in 2010, they had voted for obama. they were split along party lines, but they were leaning toward republicans in the congressional race. and over the course of the year they moved toward the republicans more substantially. >> so these are the sought-after swing voters that we read and hear and talk so much about. >> yes, absolutely. >> neil, i'm going to use some of the words that you guys use or as i should say the folks that you polled used to describe the president. >> right. >> disappointing, mediocre, wishy washy, endifferent.

those are some of the word they used. but yet you say or you found that they still don't seem to have given up on this president. >> and craig, i think that was more of the interesting findings in the entire project we did. these voters, they're dissatisfied. they're frustrated. they're in the frontlines of the economy right now. they're squeezed. but they still have hope that things can turn around. they haven't given up hope on obama. but what's interesting is they've lost the passion they had three years ago for him. and there's a sense that he's lost that passion as well. but they're not throwing in the towel quite yet. >> did we find out anything about their position on the other party's candidates or the other party in general? >> you know what's interesting is i don't think these voters are paying a lot of attention to election politics yet. they are interested in kitchen table issues. putting gas in the car, putting food on the table, making it through the next month's mortgage. they're not focused on the

national issues right now or certainly not the republican candidates either. >> in the past marjorie we've heard about security moms, we've heard about soccer moms, of course. what makes this group, this particular group, these walmart moms, what makes them so different from other groups that we've seen in the past? >> well, what's interesting about them is one, the struggles that moms with young children are facing. and how the personal is really political, you can hear the detail with which they speak about their own personal economic strategies, whether it's teaching their kids to collect cans or saving for their kids's college education or how they do couponing. so they're really less plugged into and really dissatisfied with what's going on in washington. >> right. margie omero and neil newhow's, thank you both so much. appreciate your time the he said she said

controversy in the massachusetts senator's race continues. two female republican senators now have come to the defense of their colleague. republican scott brown over some comments that he made that have been judged insensitive by many. the controversy all started when democratic primary candidate elizabeth warren said during a debate, unlike brown, she never took her clothe off to pay for law school. well, brown equipped yesterday when asked about the comment "thank god". brown was labelled insensitive, but senators susan collins of maine and kelly iote of new hampshire say basically brown did what he had to do to pay for college. plus they note that she started it. and rick perry may want to invest in a typist. the smart politics blog of university of minnesota has gotten ahold of some of his paperwork that his campaign filed to run for president, and it discovered that team perry of all the republican candidates is the only one that did not cleanly type perry's official paperwork. instead his paperwork was

handwritten. smart politics says it is unknown whose handwriting it is, only that it isn't alwalegible is everything capitalized that should be. ♪ that's good morning, veggie style. hmmm [ male announcer ] for half the calories -- plus veggie nutrition. could've had a v8. new intense shadowblast [ drew ] what's the latest in eye couture? from covergirl. the news? it's eye shadow with primer built-in. fadeproof, waterproof, totally ignore-proof! oh yes! new intense shadowblast from easy, breezy, beautiful covergirl.

we could be hearing straight from the doctor's mouth today in the michael jackson death trial. on the stand right now, dan anderson, a toxicologist in the los angeles county coroner's office. later today, though, prosecutors are expected to play the police interview of jackson's personal physician, dr. conrad murray, who's been charged with involuntary manslaughter. thursday the defense tried to discredit investigator, alyssa fleek from the coroner's office. >> would you agree with me that you made a substantial number of mistakes in your investigation of this case? >> no. >> you wouldn't? would you agree with me that if you don't take notes, you don't

keep your notes, that's bad investigation, that's bad investigative work. would you agree? >> no. >> joining me here in the studio, legal analyst, former sex crimes prosecutor. even though the investigator says isn't that bad investigative work, she did admit she could have done things differently. did that help the defense? >> i do think it did. you may not have thought so. but the reality is it did. you have a woman who did not put in the salient factors, that is about the propofol bottle in the iv bag until two years later. i mean, that's a bad fact. also she moved things around in the bedroom. that's the crime scene. these are things that little as they seem could real hi go to the heart of the defense, which is the cause of death. >> the cumulative effect of these little things could really help the defense. today could be the first time we hear at least because again audio tape not a videotape, but

we could hear from dr. conrad murray, that police investigation. what do you suspect we are going to learn from that? >> remember one thing most important, if he does not testify this is the only time we're going to hear him. he is going to set out the time of death that he says it occurred. he's going to say what he gave, what he administered, what kind of doctor he was. i imagine much of it will be self-serving. but the important thing is that that timeline may also be his death knell. >> yesterday in the trial, much has been made obviously the defense's contention is that michael jackson essentially killed himself. he o.d.ed and he killed himself. yesterday we found out that of the bottles in the room, his fingerprints weren't found on any of the drug bottles. >> well, they need another expert. they need to get an expert for the defense to be able to say the fingerprints are just not necessarily found everywhere and that's pretty lame, pretty thin.

>> you contend this will be the battle of the experts. >> no question about it. that's all they've got. >> do you think we'll hear from dr. murray? >> not if i were representing him. there is no way i would put him on the witness stand. >> why? >> well because he has said so many contradictory things. he's been portrayed as someone who lies to get himself out of trouble. and you always know -- let me tell you. when i was a criminal defense lawyer actively? worse thing you could ever do is put someone on the stand unless it's absolutely critically necessary. >> always appreciate the insight. have a great weekend. >> i'm craig melvin. thanks for watching. have a fantastic weekend. we'll see you back here monday noon in the east, 9:00 a.m. out west. up next, "andrea mitchell reports kwlgz. you name it.

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right now, jobs wanted. 103,000 new jobs were added in september. that may be enough to calm fierce in the markets but will

it satisfy thousands of protesters voicing their anger at wall street for the first time today, team obama tries to reassure by using a familiar face. >> we need to show not only that we are open for business but to use every tool in our tool box to attract it. >> unemployment rate stays the same, speaker boehner isn't buying it. >> we'll probably hear from the powers that be here at washington is more of the same. more stimulus, more taxes, more regulation, and more debt piled on the backs of our kids and grandkids. has any of it worked? no. and also this hour, the nobel peace prize goes to three women, a strong signal from the committee that role of women in fighting for freedom around the world. we will talk live with one of the new laureates and the romney doctrine. how is it different from president obama's foreign policy in the republican candidate